


——— 


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pia | (019 


[INTERNATIONAL SERIES NO. 1] 

















Unitarianism and the 
Missionary Spirit 


Lewis G. Wilson 
a 


Published for Raw diseibuton 
AMERICAN UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION 
Zee araeUN oo Lehner, BOSTON, U.S. A, 





THE AMERICAN UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION 
WAS FOUNDED IN 1825 WITH THE 
FOLLOWING EXPRESSED PURPOSE 


“The object of the American Unitarian 
Association shall be to diffuse the know- 
ledge and promote the interests of pure 
Christianity ; and all Unitarian Christians * 
shall be invited vo unite and co-operate 
with it for that purpose.” 


(The General Conference of Unitarian 

and Other Christian Churches, passed 
the following vote at Saratoga, N. Y., 
in 1894.) 


“These Churches accept the religion of 
Jesus holding, in accordance with his 
teaching, that practical religion is summed 
up in love to God and love to man.” 


“The Conference recognizes the fact 
that its constituency is Congregational in 
tradition and polity. Therefore, it declares 
that nothing in this Constitution is to be 
construed as an authoritative test; and we 
cordially invite to our working fellowship 
any who, while differing from us in belief, 
are in general sympathy with our spirit 
and our practical aims.” 





UNITARIANISM AND THE MISSIONARY 
| elec a bd 


Christianity, among all the great religions of the 
world, has been committed to international and in- 
ter-racial sympathies. Its initial exhortation was, 
“Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to 
every creature.”? Whoever breathed the breath of | 
life was an object of its legitimate solicitude. Jews 
and Gentiles, Greeks and Barbarians, bond and free, 
all tongues and kindreds, principalities and powers 
were to receive its glorious announcements. 

At first, independent congregations, or mere 
assemblies, were formed and their members were to 
learn and repeat the gospel of peace and good will, 
the gospel of a common fatherhood and a common 
Brotherhood. The old language of imperialism, 
familiar to the pagan world, and that of a theocratic 
despotism, familiar in Hebrew literature, were to 
give place to the language of the family, everywhere 
prevalent in the gospels. The “ glad tidings ” were 
so inspiring, the new light they shed upon human 
nature was so surprising, and the assurances they 
cast upon the future were so convincing that, every- 
where, its converts acquired a passion to eonvey the 
message to others. And well they might, for that 
message was in no sense merely the philosophical 
_rearrangement of certain old and familiar life- 
theories. It was not an abstract and impersonal 
system of ethical relations. It was a proclamation, 
an announcement, a startling piece of information 


3) 


4 


about life and destiny. Its sponsors were not peda- 
gogues and lecturers and theorizers, out for the pur- 
pose of discussing the subject of religion, Irom 
John the Baptist on, for at least two hundred: years, 
the distinguishing characteristic of Christianity con- 
sisted in the fact that its apostles were criers, telling 
the news! 

Without entering into the subject matter of that 
news which the earliest Christians announced, if 
bore one characteristic which contrasted it from the 
prevailing thought of religion. It was altogether 
prospective. Its concern was about the future. 
What was to come to pass meant more to it than 
what had already happened. It cared less for the 
generally accepted authorities, than for certain great 
hopes and promises that it entertained. 

In this remote age of the world, after some twenty 
centuries of Christian influence it 1s almost impos- 
sible for us to realize the significance of this atti- 
tude of Christianity. It was unique among the 
religions of the world. Judaism was so committed: 
to Moses and the Prophets that the Jewish Church 
was absorbed in ascertaining and enforcing what they 
authorized. It was to many inconceivable that a 
human being could be religious at all without con- 
fining his conduct to the established formulas of the 
past. The Talmud embodied that past and of it 
an able authority has said —‘* Accepted as a 
standard study, it became endeared to the people, 
who, as they were forbidden to-add to or diminish 
from the law of Moses, would not suffer the work of 
their Rabbis to be tampered with in any man- ° 
ner.” 

Among the Greeks, so far as religion was a con- 


5 


scilously recognized force in human society, it was 
also “‘a thing of the past” rather than a hope of 
the future. The Oracles were ancient and even as 
long before as the time of Socrates the enemies of 
that wonderful man could evoke no graver charge 
against him than that he sought to introduce new 
divinities, or that he brought contempt upon the 
antique institutions of the State. And when, five 
hundred years later, the apostle Paul stood in the’ 
midst of Mar’s Hill his diplomatic mind saw at 
once that he could escape arrest only by the adroit 
appropriation of one of their own familiar deities 
which he at once indentified with his own ‘ God 
that made the world and all things therein.” 

Thus Christianity reversed the attention of the 
world. It started out with a series of contrasts be- 
tween the past and the present or future,—‘t Ye have 
heard it said,” etc., etce., “ but I say unto you,” ete. 
It enumerated many things that had fulfilled their 
function, like servility to the memory of Abraham, 
the infallibility of the law and the prophets, the 
austere and mechanical exhibition of piety, the pro- 
tracted repetition of forms, ceremonies and prayers. 
It proclaimed itself the harbinger of a new order of 
things, “ Blessed are the eyes which see the things 
that ye see.” 

Always it was looking forward, announcing new 
laws of conduct for a higher and a better expression 
of life, foretelling days and centuries when the 
eruelties and wrongs of the past and the present 
would be done away, proclaiming among its dreams 
and allegories the coming of new heavens and new 
earths. — 

No wonder, then, that Christianity became the 


6 


greatest missionary religion. The man who comes 
to you with good news about the future presents 
himself in a very different manner from the man who 
comes to tell you of certain facts about the past. 
The one is filled with the spirit of anticipation; the 
other with the teacher’s desire to have you rightly 
informed. ‘The one includes you in some great good 
fortune that is about to appear; the other, being 
himself interested in something that has already 
happened, seeks to awaken in you a kindred interest 
for purely intellectual satisfactions. The one is a 
herald to announce the approach of unexpected bless- 
ings; the other informs you concerning past events. 

It should not be forgotten that in this particular 
respect lies the chief contribution of Christianity to 
the progress of the world—in the change of atti- 
tude from the contemplation and servile veneration 
of the past to the eager and joyous anticipation of 
the future. 

And as they became possessed of this passionate 
expectancy of future good the early Christians nat- 
urally began to interpret it in such terms as their 
own capacity dictated. You will remember that 
Jesus himself never particularizes about the future. 
He simply proclaims divine glories on the ground 
that this is God’s world and we are God’s children. 
He puts all his faith in and he directs our faith 
towards the inclination and ability of God to do by 
us the best thing possible. ‘“ Behold the fowls of 
the air; for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor 
gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth 
them. Are ye not much better than they?” 

But he nowhere undertakes detailed desériptions 
of what God has provided for his children in this 


7 


world or the next. The Kingdom of Heaven which. 
he predicts applies to the conditions of life on earth 
quite as often as it does to the possible felicities of 
the world to come. In short, Jesus in turning the 
attention -of the world from the past to the future 
leaves us to imagine that future in the highest terms 
of which we at any given age are capable. And then 
he also gives us many a precept and parable to show 
how we may become oe of an ever-improved 
idea of that future. 

But those who followed him did not have his 
ability to appreciate the great spiritual laws of 
progress, and so they could not be satisfied with his 
splendid generalization of future good. They at 
once began to particularize about the future. In 
the teaching of the new faith, their own -narrow 
and often selfish conception of human welfare be- 
came hopelessly involved. Even while Jesus yet 
spake they urged him to reserve places for his fol- | 
lowers in the very paradise from which he sought to 
divert their attention to higher and more important 
things. 

And thus, as the Christians multiplied and gath- 
ered to their numbers thousands who could follow 
him no farther than to turn their faces from the past 
to the future, they read into that future, both for this 
world and the world to come, conditions that would 
have amazed him beyond expression. They peopled 
that future with the lost and the saved. They 
divided it into a localized heaven and a localized hell. 
They filled the little span of existence on this side of 
the grave with austerities and sacrifices in order to 
secure a title to the selfish glories that awaited them 
upon the other side of the grave. In order to ad- 


8 


vance the interests of their fantastic heaven they 
evolved great earthly empires and hierarchies, with 
endless ceremonials and complex officialism — open 
avenues for the satisfaction of vanity and pride and 
the greed of power. 

This was inevitable. In the light of all that 
human nature is capable of becoming, the human 
nature that caught and responded to the Christian 
impulse was crude, materialistic and selfish. The 
uninediate purpose of Christianity was accomplished, 
not in the vast mechanism that undertook to propa- 
gate it, but in the new attitude and the expectant 
zeal which it compelled the Western world to adopt. 
Its apostles taught doctrines which are proved to 
have little or no basis in fact, its visions of the here- 
after have often been purely apocalyptic, its atti- 
tude towards the social and political conditions of 
this world has often been dominated by the spirit 
of despotism in church and state. but within its 
inmost essence the living soul of its founder, despite 
the errors and abuses that have been harbored, has 
made its appeal in the interests of an ever new 
heaven and an ever new earth. Its missionaries have 
many times circled the earth. They have penetrated 
into the treacherous gloom of savagery and barbarism 
and boldly assailed the religious institutions of every 
civilization in the world. There is no chapter in 
history which compares with the missionary enter- 
prises of Christendom. Loyalty to that vision of 
future good, often seen in distorted outlines and 
fictitious symbols, has shown to what extremities of 
courage, self-sacrifice, suffering, endurance, forgive- 
ness and unquestioning obedience human nature is 
capable. 


9 


And thus it has come about that, for fully seven- 
teen centuries, the efficiency and value of any Chris- 
tian religious movement has been gauged by its in- 
terest in and support of foreign and other missions. 
To this day it is not unusual to test the value and 
integrity of a Christian denomination by the statistics 
it can marshal in favor of missionary activities. 

And now, to come abruptly to the purpose which 
~ this paper has in view, in what way and to what 
extent can the Unitarian body sustain the test which 
is thus imposed upon it in common with all other 
Christian denominations? To what extent and in 
what way does it justify its existence, or propose to 
justify its existence, by its competency as a mis- 
sionary body? For, if one consults encyclopedias 
or other authorities upon this matter he will find 
such meagre statistics as to almost inspire an appar- 
ently well-deserved contempt for Unitarianism. 
And it is often the case that preachers and writers 
connected with the great proselyting organizations of 
Christendom point to the numerically small Uni- 
tarian organizations in this and other countries and 
hold them up to derision because of their seeming 
lack of interest in the propagation of their faith. 

As will be pointed out presently Unitarianism has 
had its own peculiar and important work to do in 
this world and it does not need to justify itself or 
its works by the standards and tests employed by 
the majority of the Christian sects. And yet, even 
by those standards it is not wholly to be set aside. 

It has already been shown that when Christianity 
entered human society its chief concern was about 
the future. In this respect it differed from Judaism 
and Paganism. ‘Its authority was vested in the 


a LA 


present possibility of each soul to determine what, 
for it, was the will of God with regard to the future. 
This was the position of Jesus. Concerning the 
character of the future Jesus did not particularize. 
He announced its perpetual approach and he indi- 
cated the general laws whereby mankind could ad- 
just itself to that ever-enlarging future. 

Up to this point Unitarians have always stood 
with him. They, too, have the prospective spirit. 
They believe in the progress of mankind onward 
and upward forever, and probably no religious body 
has ever contemplated the future, whether of this 
world or the next, with greater joy and confidence. 

But how is it to-day with those ecclesiastical estab- 
lishments,and those so-called ‘* evangelical” denomi- 
nations that are able to point to the greatest statistical 
results in missionary endeavors? Have they been 
content to leave the spirit of hope, anticipation and 
trust to lead the world to larger issues? Have they 
been willing to take the position of their deified 
Leader and go forth into all truth and all achieve- 
ment, nothing doubting, and with no attempt to cre- 
ate specific and detailed conceptions of the world to 
come ¢ 

Have they been content, as Jesus was, to leave the 
past to take care of itself in order that they might 
throw themselves into the vast, white harvest-fields 
stretching on before ¢ 

On the contrary, the organizations that were 
evolved primarily to turn the attention of the world 
from a servile submission to antique authorities and 
to inspire an hitherto unknown zeal in behalf of hu- 
man freedom, education and spiritual greatness, al- 
most immediately constituted themselves authorities 


wet d 


11 


with temporal and eternal powers over the very peo 
ple they had been created to release. 

As soon as they acquired a past of their own it 
began to adopt the tyrannies of the past they had 
abandoned. ‘They erystallized their authorities in 
books, creeds, sacraments, rituals, titles and formu- 
laries; they developed oppressive systems of disci- 
pline and graduated scales of dignitaries and officials, 
until the Christian world could no longer devote 
itself to the great needs of the future without jeop- 
ardizing its loyalty to a past that claimed for itself 
an unquestioning submission. 

In their interpretations of life they wandered a 
measureless distance .from the simplicity of the 
Founder of Christianity, and as they spread forth 
over the earth through the impulse of the missionary 
spirit they made their converts on the basis of a the- 
ology which cannot be reconciled with the sanctions 
of reality and reason. 

Now while Unitarianism appreciates all the good 
that has come incidentally and directly from Chris- 
tian missions, it has never been able to endorse the 
hfe-theory upon which they have been and are con- 
ducted. The Unitarian habit of mind cannot think 
of human nature as lost and in need of salvation 
from a primal curse. It believes in the essential in- 
tegrity of all life. In this world the human soul is 
subjected to temptations from which it should be pro- 
tected, to evils from which it should be rescued, 
to weaknesses and follies that it should outgrow. It 
must be enlightened concerning the uses it can make 
of the earth and all that it contains; but it cannot 
be thought of as the victim of mischance, and the 
supposed inefficiency of a finite God. 


12 


For these and many similar reasons Unitarians 
have never indulged in those sweeping and terrible 
warnings concerning ‘*‘ the wrath to come,” by means 
of which millions of converts have been frightened 
into a “‘ salvation ” which, as a dogma, they could not 
understand. 

But they have been able to turn their faces to a 
progressive future and in the joy of unwavering con- 
fidence in the ultimate soundness of the universe, to 
engage with enthusiasm in carrying “ glad tidings ”’ 
into all parts of the world. 

Now what is the nature of the missionary work 
which Unitarians have promoted? ‘In answering 
this question it 1s obvious that only a brief and gen- 
eral statement can be made. 

1. It is Christian — Christian in the sense of 
possessing the forward look. It is filled with hope 
and anticipation. It is not committed to the past. 
Its authority is not derived from councils, creeds, 

ecclesiastical tribunals. It trusts human reason, 
seeks to strengthen and enlighten the conscience of 
the world and to increase the God-consciousness in 
every individual. It has been the first of all reli- 
gious bodies to aecept the conclusions of science and 
to advocate such readjustments of human society as 
are in harmény with those conclusions. It has long 
since accepted the higher criticism of the Bible, and 
it sees only a reason for rejoicing as the vaster con- 
ceptions of the physical ‘universe have been un- 
folded. 

It is easy to see that, in holding such an attitude, 
Unitarians have harbored a sane and _ legitimate 
optimism. Instead of lamenting the passing of the 
old, they have exulted in the arrival of the new. 


13 


Instead of looking back with a despairing sigh to 
so-called “ages of faith,” they have looked forward 
to ages of confidence. Thankful for the wisdom of 
antiquity they are equally convinced of the wisdom 
of posterity. 

Thus they have come into possession, from genera- 
tion to generation, of “‘ good news.” Not only what 
was “news” two thousand years ago, but what is 
“news ” to-day — about human relations and needs, 
about the larger and more adequate ideas of God and 
about the nature of His will towards us. And the 
same impulse which prompted the disciples to go 
forth and give to the world the benefit of what was 
“news” to them has prompted Unitarians to an- 
nounce to the world that which is “news” to later 
generations. 

Thus it must be seen that the missionary spirit, as 
a Christian force promoted by Unitarianism, re- 
ceives its inspiration and genius more especially from 
the teachings of Jesus than from those of the apos- 
tle Paul and the theologies of later times. And 
herein it differs from the great missionary movements 
of the so-called “ evangelistic ” enterprises of Chris- 
tendom. Its enthusiasm is derived, not from the 
assumption that the soul must be saved from a primal 
curse, but that it is the last and most wonderful 
product of God’s creative wisdom and power on 
this planet. Its purpose is not to rescue the soul 
from a fancied perdition in the world to come; but, 
by working together with God, to assist it in over- 
coming its imperfections and outgrowing its weak- 
nesses and healing its wounds. The Unitarian mis- 
sionary spirit finds in the parables of Jesus and in 
the Sermon on the Mount and in the example of his 


14 


life its chief incentive to “ preach the gospel to every 
creature.” : 

2. It is Educational. The missionary spirit has 
found expression through Unitarianism as an Edu- 
cational Force. Not only has it not feared, it has 
believed in and promoted the education of the masses. 
It is essentially democratic in this respect. It does 
not argue that it is unsafe to teach the ‘‘ common 
people ” the truth about religion or science or his- 
tory. It has never tolerated the policy of suppres- 
sion. It was no mere chance that Horace Mann, 
“the father of the public school”, was a Unitarian. 
It was not a matter of accident that nine successive 
presidents of Harvard College were Unitarians. 

Peter Cooper, who founded the great Cooper In- 
stitute to enable the clerk, the tradesman and the 
common laborer to acquire an education sufficient 
to enable him to advance as an American citizen, and 
a long list of pioneer educators that might be enumer- 
ated were Unitarians by religious profession. Unt- 
tarianism had given them confidence in the free 
spirit and trust in human reason to guide the people 
out of the bondage of political and religious igno- 
rance into the “ glorious liberty of the children of 
God.” | 7 
Of course Unitarians cannot claim any monopoly 
of the free spirit. But what they can appropriate to 
their credit is the fact that, as a religious movement, 
Unitarianism has always advocated the education of 
the common people in religious progress as well as 
in every other department of human welfare. It has 
never sanctioned the teaching of one set of ideas 
about human life, in the name of secular knowledge, 
and another and different set of ideas about the 


15 


same subject, in the name of religious knowledge, 

But the point which | wish to emphasize is this, 
viz., that it is the missionary spirit — the desire. to 
earry “ good news *— that has prompted Unitarians 
to insist on the propagation of knowledge, not among 
a favored few only, but in all parts of the world and 
to every creature. ‘They have shown their faith in 
“the light that is in thee”? and have not been afraid 
to teach all men, old and young, the truth about life, 
about the Bible, about human and divine relations — 
as such knowledge has been revealed from year to 
year. . 

While other religious bodies have devoted them- 
selves to the salvation of souls through ‘‘ conversion ”’, 
Unitarianism has been advocating a_ process of 
growth from conditions of ignorance, immaturity 
and weakness to those of an intelligent understanding 
of the laws of life, and of moral and spiritual ma- 
turity and strength. 

3. It is Emancipatory. 

As a religious foree Unitarianism has always 
sought greater freedom for all. In its view human 
nature was not spoiled in the making, but was essen- 
tially good. Hence full and unimpeded self-expres- 
sion, or freedom, was an end devoutly to be desired. 

It found expression in those great Unitarians who 
wrote the Constitution of the United States, and in 
those who were the first to organize Associated Chari- 
ties and the various societies for the prevention of 
eruclty to children. It was significantly the mis- 
sionary spirit as expressed through Unitarianism 
that prompted the great philanthropist, John Ilow- 
ard, in the middle of the Eighteenth Century, to re- 
form the prisons of Great Britain and LKurope, 


16 


emancipating their immates from unspeakable — hor- 
rors and preparing the way to the penal institutions 
of modern times. 

This great undertaking by a Unitarian was not, 
in any sense, an accident. So long as human nature 
was regarded as corrupt by nature it was perfectly 
natural to understand it to be the will of God that 
criminals should suffer such torments as the prison 
hfe of a century ago inflicted. It was only through 
those who denied the depravity of the race and af- 
firmed its priceless value in the sight of God, that 
such conditions could at that time be changed. The 
missionary spirit found a true expression of How- 
ard’s farewell words as he started out from England 
on his last long journey to Turkey, from which he 
did not return alive, when he expressed ‘‘a sincere 
desire of being made an instrument of more extensive 
usefulness to my fellow creatures than could be ex- 
pected in the narrower circle of a retired life.” 

Had Dorothea L, Dix, who reformed the asylums 
for the insane, or Henry Berg, the champion of the 
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, or 
any one of scores of other great Unitarian philan- 
thropists sought words to describe the impulse by 
which they were moved they could not have chosen 
better ones than these of John Howard. 

At the present time all churches are interested 
in progressive social conditions and Unitarianism 
cannot claim any exceptional distinction other than 
that its interpretations of human nature permitted it 
to furnish the pioneers of modern philanthropy. It 
broke down the barriers that prevented the ignorant, 
the unfortunate, the weak and criminal classes from 


aby 


being treated as the children of God rather than as 
the lost souls of a lost world. 

When Jean Irederic Oberlin settled in the pov- 
erty stricken region of Waldbach in Alsace and 
found there a degenerate and thriftless community, 
it was because he saw precious possibilities in the 
darkened souls of the people that he was enabled to 
give a Unitarian expression to his missionary zeal. 
New roads, new houses, circulating libraries, im- 
proved education, infant schools and the thorough 
elevation of the people were some of the results of 
Oberlin’s labor and what he did became the model 
for thousands of similar philanthropic enterprises. 

From the great Unitarian. leaders of education, 
philanthropy and political and religious freedom, in- 
fluences have spread throughout the world which, 
while they cannot be registered in such statistics as 
are usually presented to show the growth of churches, 
have nevertheless given expression to the Christian 
missionary spirit as that spirit first found a voice in 
the teachings of Jesus. 

When Unitarianism first began to be organized in 
America there was no desire on its part to add an- 
other to the already too numerous ** denominations ” 
of Christendom. It has never been a _ proselyting 
body. Its aim has been to educate the people and to 
inspire and promote the spirit of freedom in religion. 
So emphatically has this been its purpose that it has 
never even attempted a computation of its member- 
ship. Unitarianism itself far exceeds its organized 
strength and no statistics in existence take account 
of more than a fraction of its numerical constituency. 

Unsectarian philanthropy has prevailed among 


18 


Unitarians to a far greater degree than among the so- 
called ‘‘ evangelical ” bodies” Sums of money have 
been contributed by Unitarians to causes not under 
their supervision which, had they been devoted to 
the aggrandizement of the Unitarian Church would 
have placed it in the front rank of modern eccle- 
siastical establishments. 

The volume of hterature sent out annually by the 
British and Foreign and the American Unitarian 
Associations has steadily increased and it is now sent 
in large quantities to all parts of the world. But, 
what is even more to the point, the demand for that 
literature is greater every year. It thus finds its 
way to every country, permeating the beliefs of all 
denominations and determining the religious attitude 
of vast numbers of thinking people, especially in the 
great centers of learning. This kind of work ean 
never be gauged in any census; but it is as truly mis- 
sionary in character as that of any campaign to 
‘evangelize’ a modern city or “save” a heathen 
tribe. It implies a desire to declare “‘ good news” 
and it inspires a spirit of expectancy and confidence 
in the ever-unfolding future. 

It is impossible to enumerate all the avenues 
through which the missionary spirit finds expression 
in terms of Unitarianism. The American Unitarian 
Association with its many departments and its nu- 
merous funds devoted to the cause, and the British 
and Foreign Association having its headquarters in 
London and reaching out into all parts of the United 
Empire are the two largest missionary organizations. 
Allied with them are many Societies, Alliances and 
Unions which, by various methods, convey Unitarian 
interpretations of religion, ‘There are hundreds of 


19 


individuals who are distributing literature, conduct- 
ing correspondence with inquirers and sending mes- 
sages of liberal thought to isolated people in remote 
regions and to places where churches have not as yet 
been established. A large group of Unitarian insti- 
tutions has existed in Hungary since 1568, where at 
one time the State Church itself was of that denomi- 
nation. Recent investigations show that Unitarian- 
ism is growing in the thought and is represented in re- 
ligious organizations in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, 
France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Norway, Spain, 
Sweden and Switzerland. 
Contradictory as the expression: may seem the 
American Unitarian Association is engaged in For- 
eign Missions at home. It is a well-known fact that 
thousands of foreigners who come to this country, not 
realizing that there is no civil freedom without law 
and no religious hberty without righteousness, being 
released from the restraining influences of old-world 
monarchies and despotisms and no longer feeling the 
immediate jurisdiction of any State church, swing 
to the farthest extreme of lawlessness and irreligion. 
They frequently interpret their freedom into terms 
of license and irresponsibility. Within the bound- 
aries of the United States and Canada there is no 
mussionary work of greater importance than to teach 
these hordes that the freedom which they find in this 
new country is of little avail unless within them- 
selves is the sense of personal accountability and a 
frank and obedient recognition of the divine prin- 
ciple working in human life. Of late years the 
American Unitarian Association has set itself to the 
task of helping in this great work of fitting the for- 
eign born to use wisely the free institutions of a free 


20 


country and to evolve within themselves a new spirit- 
ual consciousness. Missions among the Italians that 
swarm in great cities have been inaugurated, 
churches and’ settlements among the Scandinavians 
of the Northwest have for years been promoted, a 
number of Unitarian Icelandic churches (the only 
ones in the world) have organized themselves into a 
conference in the Northwestern Provinces of Canada, 
having a Field Secretary under the direction of the 
American Unitarian Association. Work among the 
Finnish colonies is also of great importance and 
churches under our missionary guidance, with Fin- 
nish preachers, are among the most interesting of our 
ventures among New Americans. 

In India there is the Khasi Hills Mission, with 
stations at Jowai, Nongtalong and other places. 
The Banda Missien exerts a large and increasing’ in- 
fluence over a wide territory, while ‘* the various sec- 
tions of the Brahmo Somaj in the Theistie Church 
of India are Unitarian in their theology.” Besides 
these there are Unitarian Postal Missions at Bombay, 
Caleutta, Madras, and Shillong. 

Through the efforts of the American Unitarian 
Association a Unitarian fitting school for the minis- 
try has been established at Tokyo, Japan. This 
school is now largely supported by the Japanese 
themselves and the teaching is done almost wholly by 
Japanese scholars. They have translated many 
Unitarian books and edit a Unitarian Review. 

In Australia, New Zealand and ‘Tasmania 
churches have been established and missionary enter- 
prises inaugurated. ; 

Christianity among all the great religions of the 
world, I repeat, has been committed to international 


and inter-racial sympathies. It is interesting to no- 
tice how, in its later developments, Unitarianism has 
shown and is showing its capacity for international 
activities. These interests have come into special 
prominence since the opening of the present century 
under the supervision of the American and the brit- 
ish and Foreign Associations. 

It has long been a matter of profound regret that 
Christendom has not, especially in these later years, 
awakened more fully to the immediate possibilities 
of realizing the first Christian dream of “ peace on 
earth, good will to men.” ‘The - nations have 
been drawn into the closest commercial relations; 
provincialism is rapidly fading out under the spell 
of a wonderful world-consciousness. lashes of in- 
telligence transmitted from continent to continent, 
from sea to sea, from nation to nation, over the en- 
tire surface of the earth create common interests and 
inspire kindred sympathies among all the inhabitants 
thereof. Certain principles of government that in- 
volve the happiness and welfare of all the people 
cannot longer be ignored by those who have inherited 
the ruling privilege, and the differences that have di- 
vided the religious institutions of the world are be- 
coming less conspicuous as the sovereignty of spirit- 
ual a ces 1s more generally recognized. 

In view of these facts how inconsequential appear 
those theological crochets over which Protestant sects 
have contended so bitterly and. so long! How im- 
portant it is that all religious bodies of every name 
should hasten to admit the inevitable necessity, and 
even the desirability, of difference of opinion while 
they accept and cultivate a genuine unity of the 
spirit ! 


22 


Those who have heard the eall of the Twentieth 
Century and are moved by the same impulse that 
prompted the disciples of Jesus to anticipate a new 
heaven and a new earth now realize the necessity of 
inaugurating the reign of universal fellowship. ‘To 
this end, in 1900 the first’ of our International Coun- 
cils was held in Boston, and since then the great gath- 
erings of Liberals in London, Amsterdam, Geneva 
and Berlin, under the auspices of Unitarian leaders, 
are prophetic of far-reaching influences. They 
promise as much in the interests of religious concord 
as the Lutheran Reformation was productive of 
sectarian division and strife. 

The world is older and wiser in this respect than it 
was in Luther’s time. Leading men and women are 
more comprehensive in their sympathies and more 
sympathetic in their judgments. A world-conscious- 
ness has turned their attention to larger issues than 
sectarian loyalty and ecclesiastical prestige. 

The simple logic of events has committed a large 
share of this work to Unitarians. Being anchored 
by no eredal obligations, being ambitious of no ec- 
clesiastical supremacy, desiring only that the human 
race should trust the future and work to glorify it, 
the Unitarian body can and does issue a loud eall to 
all the contending camps of Christendom and in- 
sists that the age of little differences has passed away 
and the time of spiritual unity has arrived. 

What a challenge is here for the exercise of all the 
highest faculties of human nature! To utter the 
prophetic ery for international peace and the perma- 
nent cessation of that one most horrible survival of 
barbarism called war! ‘To labor for the recognition 
of a tribunal of international justice,— a veritable 


23 


Court of Nations! To. discover and promote the 
ethical principles of international commerce! ‘To 
harbor the thought and insist on the growth of a real 
international citizenship! ‘To take the world into 
our confidence and to be satisfied with nothing which 
does not apply to the welfare of all God’s children, 
because they are God’s children! Surely this is to - 
rise above the petty antagonisms of denominational 
self-interest into occupations that are worthy of the 
new age in which we are living. 

Unitarianism in the hands of those who have al- 
lowed themselves to be organized for purposes of re- 
ligious enlightenment and inspiration has not by any 
means accomplished all that might have been done 
and ought to have been done in the name of so true 
and lofty a gospel. But throughout the world there 
are signs of a great intellectual awakening. And 
through this awakening the old, unscientific and ob- 
solete methods that sought only to rescue the individ- 
ual from impending ruin will be forgotten in the 
larger and grander attempt to bring peace and good 
will to all nations and into all the relations of human 
society. 


sionary organization of the Unitarian churches of America, 

and is supported by the voluntary contributions of churches 
and individuals. [t seeks to promote sympathy and united action 
among Liberal Christians, and to spread the principles which are 
believed by Unitarians to be essential to civil and religious liberty 
and progress and to the attainments of the spiritual life. To this 
. end it supports missionaries, establishes and maintains churches, 
holds conventions, aids in building meeting-houses, publishes, 
sells and gives away books, sermons, tracts, hymn-books and 
devotional works. 


P “HE American Unitarian Association is the working mis- 


A list of free tracts will be sent on application. A full descrip- 
tive catalogue of the publications of the Association, including 
doctrinal, devotional and practical works, will be sent to all who 
apply. 

There are thousands of people who are Unitarians, but who, 
because there are no Unitarian churches near at hand, are not 
members and do not take the part they would like to take in the 
propagation of liberal religious ideas. 


There are other thousands who are Unitarians and do not know 
it until they read the literature which we are distributing, free of 
cost, in all parts of this and other countries. 


In return for one dollar and your signature upon an application 
card you will be enrolled in our Associate Membership Depart- 
ment, and you will receive each new pamphlet or tract which is 
published by the Association. Moreover, you will have the 
satisfaction of co-operating with us in this work. You will be 
kept in touch with the activities of our churches, and by your 
sympathetic interest you can, through this membership, assist 
others to what they will regard as genuine benefactions. 


Unitarian Word and Work is a monthly report of denominational 
news, published as a special department of The Christian Register, 
from October to June inclusive. It is of special value to Associate 
Members who are unable to enjoy the privilege of attending a 
Unitarian church. The subscription price, 50 cents per year, 
brings it within the reach of everyone. 


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